Stranger arrested after 75-year-old woman was sexually assaulted at 4S Ranch home

A 75-year-old woman was sexually assaulted Thursday morning in her 4S Ranch home, and a suspect — a stranger to the victim — was arrested hours later, a San Diego County sheriff’s sergeant said.

Around 10:45 a.m. Wednesday, a man knocked on the door of her Carmel Valley Road home and asked the woman if her dogs needed to be washed. The dogs were located in the front yard of the property, Sgt. Marcello Orsini said this on Friday.

“The two started talking and the man was eventually invited into the house,” Orsini said in a news release.

Once inside the home, the stranger sexually assaulted the victim. The woman’s caregiver, who was also in the home, interrupted the attack, Orsini said. The man jumped into a car and fled.

Sheriff’s deputies from the 4S Ranch Sheriff’s Substation and the Sheriff’s Fraud/Elder Abuse Unit investigated. They identified a suspect through the vehicle the attacker drove away in, as well as through a photo lineup.

Less than eight hours later, officers contacted the suspect, a 52-year-old man, as he arrived home in Solana Beach. Orsini said the man was driving the same car the attacker used to flee the incident.

The suspect was booked into the Vista Detention Facility on suspicion of assault and elder abuse.